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Soviet Union [USSR] War and Peace, 1796-1825
Catherine II died in 1796 and was succeeded by her son Paul
(1796-1801). Painfully aware that Catherine had planned to bypass
him and name his son, Alexander, as tsar, Paul instituted
primogeniture in the male line as the basis for succession. It was
one of the few lasting reforms of Paul's brief reign. He also
chartered a Russian-American company, which led to Russia's
acquisition of Alaska. Paul was haughty and unstable, and he
frequently reversed his previous decisions, creating administrative
chaos and accumulating enemies.
As a major European power, Russia could not escape the wars
involving revolutionary and Napoleonic France. Paul became an
adamant opponent of France, and Russia joined Britain and Austria
in a war against France. Russian troops under one of Russia's most
famous generals, Aleksandr Suvorov, performed brilliantly in Italy
and Switzerland. Paul, however, reversed himself and abandoned his
allies. This reversal, coupled with increasingly arbitrary domestic
policies, sparked a coup, and in March 1801 Paul was assassinated.
The new tsar, Alexander I (1801-25), came to the throne as the
result of the murder of his father, in which he was implicated.
Groomed for the throne by Catherine II and raised in the spirit of
enlightenment, Alexander also had an inclination toward romanticism
and religious mysticism, particularly in the latter period of his
reign. Alexander tinkered with changes in the central government,
and he replaced the colleges set up by Peter the Great with
ministries, but without a coordinating prime minister. The liberal
statesman Mikhail Speranskii proposed a constitutional reform, but
it was never implemented.
Alexander's primary focus was not on domestic policy but on
foreign affairs, and particularly on Napoleon. Fearing Napoleon's
expansionist ambitions and the growth of French power, Alexander
joined Britain and Austria against Napoleon. The Russians and
Austrians were defeated at Austerlitz in 1805, and the Russians
were trounced at Friedland in 1807. Alexander was forced to sue for
peace, and by the Treaty of Tilsit, signed in 1807, he became
Napoleon's ally. Russia lost little territory under the treaty, and
Alexander made use of his alliance with Napoleon for further
expansion. He wrested the Grand Duchy of Finland from Sweden in
1809 and acquired Bessarabia from Turkey in 1812.
The Russo-French alliance gradually became strained. Napoleon
was concerned about Russia's intentions in the Bosporous and
Dardenelles straits. At the same time, Alexander viewed the Grand
Duchy of Warsaw, the French-controlled reconstituted Polish state,
with suspicion. The requirement of maintaining a continental
blockade against Britain made trading difficult, and in 1810
Alexander repudiated the obligation. In June 1812, Napoleon invaded
Russia with 600,000 troops--a force that was twice as large as the
Russian regular army. Napoleon hoped to inflict a major defeat on
the Russians and have Alexander sue for peace. As Napoleon pushed
the Russian forces back, he became seriously overextended. Although
Napoleon occupied a burning Moscow, the Russians refused to
surrender, and Napoleon had to retreat. The harsh wintry weather,
combined with continuous harassment by Russian forces, resulted in
the destruction of Napoleon's Grand Army. Fewer than 30,000 troops
returned from the Russian campaign.
As the French retreated, the Russians pursued them into central
and western Europe, to the gates of Paris. After the defeat of
Napoleon by the allies, Alexander became known as the "savior of
Europe," and he played a prominent role in the redrawing of the map
of Europe at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. In the same year,
under the influence of religious mysticism, Alexander initiated the
creation of the Holy Alliance, an agreement pledging the rulers of
the nations involved to act according to Christian principles. More
pragmatically, in order to prevent the resurgence of an
expansionist France, the Quadruple Alliance had been formed by
Russia, Britain, Austria, and Prussia in 1814. The allies created
an international system to maintain the territorial status quo.
This system, confirmed by a number of international conferences,
ensured Russia's influence in Europe.
At the same time, Russia continued its expansion. The Congress
of Vienna created the Russian Kingdom of Poland (Russian Poland),
to which Alexander granted a constitution. Thus Alexander I became
the constitutional monarch of Poland while remaining the autocratic
tsar of Russia. He was also the limited monarch of Finland, which
had been annexed on 1809 awarded autonomous status. In 1813 Russia
gained territory in the Baku area of the Caucasus at the expense of
Iran. By the early nineteenth century, the empire also was firmly
ensconced in Alaska.
Historians have generally agreed that a revolutionary movement
was born during the reign of Alexander I. Young officers who had
pursued Napoleon into western Europe came back to Russia with
revolutionary ideas, including liberalism, representative
government, and mass democracy. Whereas in the eighteenth century
intellectual Westernization had been fostered by a paternalistic,
autocratic state, in the nineteenth century Western ideas included
opposition to autocracy, demands for representative government,
calls for the abolition of serfdom, and, in some instances,
advocacy of a revolutionary overthrow of the government. Officers
were particularly incensed that Alexander had granted Poland a
constitution while Russia remained without one. Several clandestine
organizations were preparing for an uprising when Alexander died
unexpectedly in 1825. Following his death, there was confusion as
to who would succeed him because his heir, Constantine, had
relinquished his right to the throne. A group of officers
commanding about 3,000 men refused to swear allegiance to the new
tsar, Nicholas I, and proclaimed their loyalty to "Constantine and
Constitution." Because these events occurred in December 1825, the
rebels were called Decembrists. Nicholas had them surrounded and,
when they refused to disperse, ordered the army to fire on them.
The revolt was soon over, and the Decembrists who remained alive
were arrested. Many were exiled to Siberia.
To some extent, the Decembrists were in the tradition of a long
line of palace revolutionaries who wanted to place their candidate
on the throne. But because the Decembrists also wanted to implement
a liberal political program, their revolt has been considered the
beginning of a revolutionary movement. The "Decembrists' revolt"
was the first open breach between the government and liberal
elements--a breach that subsequently widened.
Data as of May 1989
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